


A Single Frayed Rope

by thejamesoldier



Category: Red Dead Redemption (Video Games)
Genre: Accidental Time Travel, Angst, Angst and Feels, Angst with a Happy Ending, Attempt at Humor, Attempted Rape/Non-Con, Culture Shock, Emotional Baggage, Emotional Constipation, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Epic Bromance, Epic Friendship, Epic Love, Eventual Smut, Explicit Language, F/M, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Jealous Arthur, POV Alternating, POV First Person, POV Multiple, POV Second Person, POV Third Person, Pining Arthur, Protective Arthur, Reader-Insert, Red Dead Redemption 2 Spoilers, Slow Build, Slow Burn, Sweet & Constantly Confused Arthur, Time Travel, Video Game: Red Dead Redemption 2 (2018), aka cowboys don't know what yeet means, and overall self expression, srsly arthur is the worst at communication, thanks dutch, time travler!reader, will tag that as it happens
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-02
Updated: 2019-08-23
Packaged: 2019-10-19 09:13:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 18,905
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17598446
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thejamesoldier/pseuds/thejamesoldier
Summary: It's a yeet or be yeeted world, and you refuse to be the latter.ormy take on the time traveler!reader au that's been done a million times :))))





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> So I just spent the last 72+ hours playing through Red Dead 2 (bc sleep is for the weak and the emotionally stable), and I'm rolling up to the RDR2 fandom a distraught wreck over Arthur Morgan. So. Here is my absolutely self-indulgent and completely unoriginal time traveling reader insert fic. Yeethaw

For a moment, you think you're dreaming. 

White brightness blinds you, your senses are muted and all is quiet, its just the core of you that lives in the center of your being throbbing through nothingness. The light fades only when the heaviness of matter begins to settle like an iron blanket over you, wrapping around your soul and pulling you from the void, manifesting you into the solidness required of the present. Color seeps in to stain your vision, swirling into the outlines of things and smearing horizons above and below you. It takes a second for anything to be recognizable, for consciousness to drive you. 

A silent winter forest solidifies in your reality, a pocket of powdery snow cradles you from the frosty wind as it weaves like a giant invisible snake through the gaps between the trees. You uncurl from a fetal position once you get your bearings only to wince at the ache in your body as you slowly push yourself to sit up. Warmth oozes from your pores as your naked body jerks itself into spasms trying to loosen the chill that grips your spine and holds a fist of pressure just behind your lungs. From the ground, you look up at the towering snow-laden pine trees that surround you in a perfect impossible circle. The densely packed forest contrasts sharply with the negative space of the clearing that you sit dead center in, like you were dropped straight from the sky. There is no disturbed snow or any signs of movement within the forest line. The air is crisp and clear and empty of snowfall. The sheer _unnaturalness_ of it all disturbs you to your core, making you shake harder as you wrap your arms around your body and rock yourself gently in attempt to curb your panic. Clouds are heavy with the blizzard brewing inside them as you gaze at the grey overcast sky searching for answers that aren't there. The trees seem to peer down at you and shiver with suspicion -- an arm of fresh snow slides off a low fanning branch somewhere behind you.  _Intruder_ is what the wind whispers as it laces through the pines’ thin green needles, the ancient residents of the forest hushing a word of caution to each other as the warning rustles its way across the mountain range. The wood seems to shift about you then, violently breaking its previous stillness as the wind grows stronger, like a great beast awakening. Unease settles heavily on your shoulders as the forest -- the world -- suddenly quiets again and...snow begins to fall. 

It's then, with snowflakes tangling in your lashes and the white clouds of your breath swirling like smoke in front of you, that you realize you are far  _far_ from home because something is different. The trees look like trees, the snow looks like snow, the cold feels cold, but its off. Something is _different_. Elementally. Atomically. The esoteric wisdom that hovers between stars, that connects constellations, that lives cold and old within the tapestry of everything, stalks the very matter around you, suffocates you. And call it fear or call it instinct, call it a combination of both, but you know. You  _know_ that you have transcended into something far beyond your comprehension, stumbled onto a fated path you could not possibly fathom.  

 

* * *

 

When the wolves come they bring a man with them.

He's bloody and half dead and fighting. The savagery to stay alive is infectious as it takes hold in the harbor of your heart and gives you the necessary push you've been waiting for. Your survival instincts surge and boil under your skin as you and the man run in a collision of panic and confusion up out of the forest and into the jaws of the exposed glacial cliffs. The wolves leave you to your fates at the edge of the forest, knowing you'll either come back down eventually or die up here. Either way you become a meal.

The man grunts through his pain as you climb higher and doesn't acknowledge you struggling to keep up a few feet beside him. You chose to run with him when he burst into your clearing and you chose to stay with him after escaping mostly out of instinct, a raw part of you that was ripped from ancient genes belonging to a creature of survival more than that of a human urging you to do so. You knew sticking together was your best chance.

But once the spiked adrenaline born of the danger that the wolves brought fades, the man stops dead in his tracks and directs the fight in him at you -- another obstacle for him to face in order to survive. You forget to cover yourself but you do squat slowly to the ground after a beat of tense eye contact, the snow numbing your lower body as it touches the skin there. This display was also instinct -- to make yourself small. The shivering gets more violent as you're submerged in deep snow, but you worry about when the shivering will stop. The man who fought the wolves and lived sees you, truly sees you, and with his mind still locked in survival mode, John Marston registers you as -- Doe. _P_ _rey_. Ally. Safe. You sense the moment he decides you aren't an enemy, you see it shift something in his eyes. He turns away.

Without words -- incapable of words -- you both work your way across the blizzard scorched cliff side. You eventually find a secluded patch of ground semi-sheltered from the wind by the cliff face looming behind it and stop there to rest. After a while, you notice the man is unable to get back up from where he laid down. He tries to heave his body up, groaning and screaming and gritting his teeth but is ultimately unable to continue on. You sense none of the fight he had in him earlier, in fact you feel him _let it go_ as his body goes lax beside you and he lets out a soft broken sob. At the time it didn't even cross your mind to leave him, to keep going to try and find help or a way back down. You simply settled down next to him, not touching, not talking, and slowly froze to death together.

At some point you stopped shivering.

You stopped feeling limbs.

The man eventually left himself, fell into a coma of pain, mind thrown somewhere deep within his subconscious.

You left yourself too, you think. You don't remember much from that time, and that's what you tell them whenever they ask you about it. All you knew was muted emptiness, but different from the one that brought you here. And when Arthur and Javier find John next to a mostly dead naked woman, they have as many questions as you do when you wake up.  


	2. Colter I

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So Arthur's got his own horse (of course not poor Boadicea) like the other gang members do and not that Tennessee Walker pinto you get in the start of the game bc reasons and artistic license :)))))))

* * *

  _The Northwestern Peaks of Grizzlies East, Ambarino_  ~ **Unknown Date**  

* * *

 

You know for sure you're dreaming this time. 

Blue clear skies reign above you, a mountain sleeps below you, and green grass rolls gently over the steep rock inclines on either side of you. Wildflowers humbly greet the sun as dawn breaks the fasting cold of night, life slowly awakening as light hushes into the world. An eagle soars a few leagues above you, great wings flapping as it lowers itself with its talons extended to a rock that sits behind what looks to be a, a simple grave. 

Something draws you forward, a single rope tying you irrevocably to whatever lies in the distance -- whatever is on the other end. You pick your way slowly across the uneven terrain as sweeping curtains of warmth brought by the proud dawn part before you. Despite the sun tingling against your skin, you hold yourself tight to brace against the stubborn morning chill nipping at your heels like loyal hounds, urging you to move faster towards the inevitable. There's a silence that settles around you then, broken only by the sound of your footsteps that crunch against the gravel as you walk. You stop a respectful foot in front of the humble resting place unsure of what to do but strangely not questioning why you're here. Flowers the exact color of sunset are planted in a thoughtful cluster around an erected cross, a circle of wood rounding atop all three protruding ends of the cross distinguishes it from a normal grave. A sentence is carved there while a name is displayed on the horizontal center plank. 

"Arthur Morgan," You whisper softly after a moment, reading the name carefully but lovingly etched into the fresh wood. The name feels foreign on your tongue but none the less it yanks on that rope anchored deep in your chest. 

Before you can read the rest of the epitaph the eagle takes off with a cry as the wind picks up suddenly, startling your gaze away from the grave. The wind doesn't gust into you as you expect it to by the swift way it lifts the eagle high into the sky. Instead it _sings_ , harmonizes with itself, as it banks against the mountain face behind you after dragging chilled fingers along your cheeks. Its as if speaking the name of the man who rests here evoked something within the surrounding nature, the moment feels sacred somehow, and in the distance you notice a stag -- proud head lifted high as it faces you. He's about a mile off, standing in a large green valley that rests just after the mountain's sheer incline gentles into sloping hills. A thick heavy morning fog curls about his hooves, the sun barely reaching him as it crawls slowly over the jagged line of the horizon and glows softly within the frame of his antlers -- a phantom of strength and beauty. Even after you meet his gaze and hold it, exposed and stripped of everything material, the great beast remains unshaken. 

Maybe this isn't a dream. 

Maybe it isn't dawn but its dusk.

And maybe...maybe this is a memory.

 

* * *

  _A Glacier Northwest of Colter_ ~ **May, 1899**  

* * *

 

Arthur doesn't understand what he's seeing at first.

Javier gives pause beside him too as they spot John and then notice the curled up form beside him. They both sway slightly on their feet when they eventually work out its a  _naked_ unconscious woman. Arthur's body jolts him forward on its own in order to begin working his way down to get her -- John, to get them both. John doesn't even seem like he knows she's there as he calls for Arthur in that raspy familiar voice of his, the sound of it reopening a wound deep in Arthur's chest that he's been constantly attempting to repair ever since John returned to the gang.

_He left us._

Arthur clenches his jaw as he approaches him, shoving the hurt away as violently as he can even though he knows it'll float back up through his subconsciousness and haunt him later. Worry, of all things, takes his sorrow's place as he really assess John's condition. But as soon as John meets his eye, spirit nearly broken as his body is, Arthur feels his familiar wall of anger spring up around him at the vulnerability, swiftly separating him from the world, a veil against his reality -- his coping mechanism polished and efficient from years of use against pain and loss. Arthur offers John a few clipped words of comfort as he bends to collect John's nearly frozen body. Its not until he heaves him -- albeit a little more roughly than necessary -- up over his shoulder and starts to pass him to Javier to carry out of the small sunken ditch they're in, that John even acknowledges the woman lying a few feet away. 

"The girl, the woman-n A-Arthur, the woman, she ain't dead, t-take her too." John gets out through his violently chattering teeth.

Arthur doesn't quite know how to respond to that as he was already planing to take her with them so he doesn't, just wordlessly bends down and gently pitches the woman up into his arms, trying to avoid looking at her nakedness as he does so.

How the hell did a woman end up running about on a frozen mountain alone and _naked_ , of all things?

Putting her over his shoulder didn't feel right, made her seem too much like a corpse, so instead Arthur carries her bridal style and holds her as close to his chest as he can as he minds his footing while navigating his way off the ledge to higher more solid ground.

Once they reach their mounts Arthur speaks over the wind that's starting to pick up again,

"Marston! Where did she come from?"

John winces as he gingerly adjusts himself behind Javier on the back of Boaz,

"Dunno, I was r-runnin' from them wolv-ves and we kind of found each other. T-Took to the high cliffs to escape."

Arthur only grunts in response as he struggles to loosen his saddle enough to pull the wool blanket that served as a saddle pad out from underneath the leather seat. Once he's wiggled it free he quickly covers the limp woman in his arms with it, hoping the heat from the worked horse settled deep in the fabric would help her thaw or at least stop her from losing any limbs if she hadn't lost them to hypothermia already. He lifts her up onto his mare Sabine after re-tightening the saddle, hushing at her when she nickers in protest at the loss of her blanket, before mounting up himself. Arthur's fingers shake with the cold as he unbuttons his thick layers of coats and pulls the woman tight against his chest. He does his best trying to button the both of you in together, forcing the stiff worn fabrics to stretch.

"Why the hell is she _naked_?" Javier asks, since no one else was willing to, as he turns Boaz in a direction that looks like it holds the safest path back to camp.

John shrugs only to instantly regret moving, the deep open wounds on his face pulling themselves wider as he lets out a shout of pain.

"Let's just get back to camp and ask questions later," Arthur orders as he positions the woman's body to curl in to him, hooking her legs over to one side of the horse and guiding her head to rest in the pocket of warmth between the side of his neck and the thick fur of his coat's flipped up collar. Any of her skin that isn't covered by his coat Arthur tucks the saddle pad around.

He pushes aside all sense of propriety as he feels Javier and John watching him maneuver her as they wait -- not judging Arthur, just uneasy with the overall absurdity of the situation. Every inch of her is pressed against him, uncomfortably so, in favor of making sure she doesn't die. He knows bare skin against bare skin is the most efficient way to share body heat, he knows this is a life or death situation going by the fact that she's starting to chill _Arthur_ to the bone with how cold she is. The severity of her condition helps him ignore his bashfulness and follow Javier's lead with his head high as he guides the small group back to camp.

Arthur promises himself he can be embarrassed and furious about all this later. 

 

* * *

_Colter_ ~ **May, 1899**

* * *

  

The first thing you register is the absence of the cold. It's strange because you had grown so used to it, you felt oddly naked without it. 

And that becomes the second thing you register: course fabric against your skin.   

You slowly stir yourself into consciousnesses, feeling like you have molasses in your veins and a heavy stone for a brain. Your body protests sharply though as you attempt to sit up once you understand you're in fact alive and no longer freezing. The pain is a deep stabbing ache that seems to have no origin but just exists in every cell of your body, and it bullies you back into stillness. Once your suffering ebbs a touch, your other senses take over. 

"Is the lost lady waking up?" A small nervous voice asks, a child. 

"Dunno Jack, but if she does she's in enough pain that I reckon she couldn't hurt us even if she tried." A responding voice hushes, tone firm but comforting and intimate. The mother. 

"Okay." 

You keep your eyes closed at that, thinking maybe you should pretend to be asleep a little longer (and you don't think your eyes could handle any form of light right now anyways). Your head throbs as being awake starts to prove to be painful and exhausting, your tongue lies heavy and dry in your mouth, and you agree with the woman -- your limbs feel like lead, so heavy you don't think you could lift your pinky finger. 

 _Weak_ , you feel so _weak_. 

And with that thought you're pulled back under the dark surf of unconsciousness. 

 

* * *

 

"Dutch, Dutch we got a lot of folk to feed now," A man's worried voice accompanied by a door banging open yanks you out the grey fray you were lost in, "If you keep savin' lost souls and taking hostages then we gotta act accordingly. We're responsible for them now and we gotta take care of everyone else! We can't do that if you go gallivanting off with the strongest in our gang robbin' trains and shootin' up O'Driscolls!" 

"Hosea I don't know what to tell you, I've said this a hundred times, we'll be _fine_. We always are. We made it back alright from that O'Driscoll camp, and we will make it back from this train robbery in tact and that much richer. We need this money. How are we gonna move everyone to a safe place without cash?" 

"We at least need to leave the goddamned snow, Dutch! Once we get to country that's  _inhabited by people_ then we can think about a big take, but right now food and not freezin' to death are our main concerns."

"Arthur and Charles found us some food, we'll be fine --,"

"No we are not fine. The two stags, both of which were starving too by the way, aren't going to last us. Arthur and Javier brought back John and a half-dead woman who we know nothing about, and then on top of that you found poor Mrs. Adler and now another O'Driscoll! Christ alive Dutch, half of us are dyin' we can't afford to risk --,"

"Hosea," The sound of hands grasping shoulders fills the pause between the man's words, "Hosea have faith in me, trust me to get us all out of this alive." 

Silence reigns then. You figure you're in a small room by the way their voices don't carry too far in the space. Wind howls outside, banging on doors and rattling windows fighting to get in. The confusion that hits you once you really catch on to their conversation alarms you so severely you begin to shake.

Gangs?

Shooting?

Robbing?

What the fuck is going on? Where are you? Who in Gods name are these people?

"I trust you Dutch, you know that, but think about this, _please,_ for me. Think about all the people that need to be the priority right now, Colm will still be there, trains and coaches and rich people to rob will still be there, but John might not make it, the woman with him who was _naked_ mind you and already half dead when they found her will probably not make it, Mrs. Adler might not make it. Davey _died_ , Dutch. Jenny is dead. We've got family missin' too, Mac and Sean --,"

"You don't have to remind me Hosea!"

"Okay, I know, but we gotta think about them and who is left. We gotta put the gang first, and ridin' out like this isn't going to help or save anyone."

"I've, I've made up my mind Hosea. This money is what we need, it will help us be comfortable once we've left the mountains."

"Dutch there are other ways to help, I know you're desperate to do something -- anything that's useful, but this isn't the way to go about it --,"

"It's too good a chance to miss and I'm taking the risk."

" _Dutch!_ " 

The door bangs open again and the two pairs of angry footsteps leave. The wind bursts in as they exit and lathers you with its icy breath, making you shake harder as the door closes and leaves you alone with the cold and a growing sense of unfathomable fear. With more effort than it should take, you finally open your eyes, your lids sticking a bit as your irises protest even in the dim lighting of the room. Once you're able to take in your surroundings your panic only increases. 

A bare wooden cabin that looks like it could be blown over if the wind pushed a hair harder turns out to be the room you've been in, a pathetic fire struggles in a fireplace with strips of cloth, twigs, and stray handfuls of hay to serve as its logs in the corner nearest to you. You're laying on a cot of some sort with no blankets, just the fabric of your clothes to shield you from the cold seeping through the generous cracks in the wood-plank walls. You finally sit up after four separate attempts once you realize you're alone. Your head swims with the change of position and your stomach gives a nauseating drop but you firmly ignore it as you try to quell the panic that's slowly inflating in your chest like an iron balloon, inch by inch it doesn't yield, growing steadily -- inevitably -- and stealing your sanity. 

The urge to run spikes in your system, your flight instinct kicking in as savagely as it did when the wolves chased you. 

You grunt as you make yourself stand, swaying dangerously on your feet you grip the splintering mantle of the fireplace to stop yourself from collapsing. Struggling to fight the buckling in your knees, you feel the adrenaline slowly feeding strength into your dead muscles, injecting you with empty energy causing you to shake and shiver like a crack addict but none the less giving you the push to get your body into motion. You stagger to the door and wait as you hear the sound of muted hooves thunder away, a small stampede charging the smirking maws of the mountains. When the voices left behind simmer down and everything seems quiet enough, you crack the door open an inch to get a look outside. You recoil almost immediately at the brightness of the sun reflecting off the blanket of snow covering everything. It takes your eyes a good ten minutes to adjust and for you to really get a sense of your situation. 

No one seems to be out, though you know people are in the cabins that line both sides of what you assume is a street or main path in the center of this small cluster of sad buildings. Everything is dilapidated and falling apart, well tread paths clue you in to which buildings are most heavily inhabited. Horse hitching posts stand lonely and bare a bit ways down and your mind struggles to wrap its head around everything. 

Where are the cars? The street lights? The telephone poles? Or any sign of genuine civilization? 

You swallow against the bile that rises from the back of your throat as panic only suffocates you further. Its bare of people outside so you could probably sneak out, but how the hell are you supposed to survive out there in nature by yourself? Especially in your condition. It's not like you could make a phone call or steal someones cell phone as you spotted none in the room on the way to the door. It's not like you could escape by stealing a car, or a... a _horse_  since that's what these people used instead of technology. Are you on some sort of farm? Is this a Mormon colony? Is there a driveway or garage further down the snow covered road you just couldn't see? All the questions swirling in your brain distract you so much that you don't hear the door that connects this room with the adjoining one open. 

"You're awake," 

You startle and collapse to the floor as three people behind you raise their hands in surrender while you shake with your back against the wall. Its the man you nearly froze to death with, a woman, and a child -- a young boy. 

"Woah okay, you're okay," The woman says in what sounds like a heavy southern accent, though it registers as slightly different from what you remember a southern accent sounding like. You can't put your finger on it. 

The woman doesn't attempt to move closer to you as she is supporting the weight of the man, but she does push the boy who you assume to be her son behind her with her free hand. You just stare and  _shake,_ unable to do much else. Now that you're on the floor it seems impossible to try and get back up, like all the adrenaline you had before has now twisted into fear and its paralyzing you instead of helping you move. They're all dressed like they're straight out of a western film, or like they're part of some high budget reenactment. The theory that this is some sort of Mormon colony dissipates like smoke in the wind because you're pretty sure established Mormons don't wear tattered rags and live in poverty like this. This only adds to your confusion and mounting anxiety. It's not until you wrap your arms around your knees that you realize you're wearing almost the exact same thing the woman is, a dull coarse frock of some sort with a heavy shift and thick skirts. 

"W-What," You croak out of your unused throat, beginning to hyperventilate. 

Why are you also wearing old fashion clothing? 

"Hey, okay you're okay, you're _safe_ ," The woman tries to emphasize gently like she's speaking to a wild animal, but you don't really hear her as your heart starts to beat too fast, your breath turns to ash in your lungs, blood rushes from your head, your ears start to ring, and all sense of reality slips from you. 

 

* * *

 

"Poor thing," Abigail murmurs, glancing over at the woman in the cot adjacent to John's while she unwraps the bandages on John's face. 

Abigail had moved her with the help of Miss Grimshaw back to her cot after she blacked out on the floor. 

John stays silent but does look over at the stranger too. The wild desperation he saw in her eyes the first time he met her on that mountain had morphed into a kind of savage panic. He feels sorry for her as she lays there exhausted and weak and scared, and is reminded how lucky he is Abigail gives a damn about him. He couldn't imagine being alone right now, being as vulnerable as he is and being on his own. He never should have left Abigail and the gang -- never should have left his family. 

"That would be me if it weren't for you," John finds himself whispering to Abigail, voice thick with rare emotion that echos out through the deep earthy brown of his eyes.

Admitting out loud that he needs her strips John down to a state of vulnerability he has never exposed to Abigail or anyone before. John knows how horrible Abigail and him are at telling each other how they feel, its endless guessing and fighting and passion and push and pull and sex and hate and give and take. This gentle moment between them is precious, and John knows Abigail recognizes this as she tenderly brushes some of his tangled matted hair away from the swollen scars on his face. Abigail avoids his gaze, afraid to shatter the moment -- afraid to scare John and this fragile intimacy away -- and only dabs gently at John's facial wounds with a cloth drenched with near frozen alcohol. A forcefully neutral expression strains her pretty features as the true weight of his words settle in her heart. John knows he is nowhere near forgiven but he's _wanted_ , as painful as it is for her he knows she wants him. Wants him to love her in the way she deserves, wants him to love Jack, wants him to let her love him, wants him to be a good man... 

"I like her." Jack offers offhandedly, breaking them out of the moment as he stares in his own little world at the sleeping stranger with that fearful curiosity of his. 

John wants to say something to stomp out the magic in Jack's eyes, to erase the air of mystery around the woman, but he manages to bite his tongue. He hates when he has urges like that, urges to destroy everything that brings Abigail's boy some semblance of joy or wonder.

 _A good man?_ John thinks bitterly, _the word good doesn't even exist in my vocabulary_.   

 

* * *

 

Returning from the successful train robbery should feel like a victory, feel _good_ , but Arthur just can't manage to gather any ego under him as he spots Hosea talking fiercely with Dutch by one of the cabins. Hosea always knows when shit is going downhill, is the brain behind Dutch's colorful brawn, and when Hosea is worried its usually a good sign that everyone should be worried. Arthur had felt hesitant about the robbery job too, but he trusted that Dutch knew what he was doing. Hell he'd follow Dutch off a cliff if it was asked of him. 

"That's it girl," Arthur murmurs at Sabine, his wild Hungarian Halfbred mare he managed to tame as the gang had been chased up into the mountains. He missed his Boadicea but this mare has an air about her, has so much fight in her he originally had thought she was a stallion. With a solid black coat that shines like polished onyx in the sun and a build that towers over everyone and everything -- even Bill's Adrennes, the majestic audacity of her stuns him almost everytime he looks at her.

Arthur guides his girl over to the hitching posts and stiffly dismounts, the cold making his muscles clamp up a bit. He brushes her as best he can with the saddle on still trying to get her used to him. He has to be really strict with her, has to really use his legs to get her to listen (especially in tense situations) since being heavy handed on the bit and tearing her mouth up would only enrage her, not encourage her to work with him. But he knows that once he's earned her trust and they both work out their special language of physical and verbal cues, that she'll make one hell of a partner in crime. Arthur sneaks her a stale oatcake he found at the bottom of a barrel Pearson had stashed in the makeshift kitchen, and pets her thick glorious neck as Dutch and Hosea's unintelligible arguing carries over the clearing to him. It sounds like its really starting to get heated and it makes Arthur's heart heavy. He sighs before giving Sabine one more rub behind her ear, getting a hard snort of attitude for his trouble, and heads toward the cabin he knew John and Abigail were holed up in.  

 

* * *

 

You have been awake and pretending to be asleep for what feels like hours now and its due to the fact that you're terrified to face reality. You keep convincing yourself that if you listen in on _one_ more conversation everything will finally make sense. But honestly, the more you eavesdrop the more confused you become. 

"It sounds like Hosea is gonna try and move us soon, probably tomorrow since the storm has finally broke." The woman who tried to comfort you during your panic attack earlier -- the mother -- says earnestly. You've since learned that her name is Abigail. 

"Well good, I never wanna be cold or see snow again for the rest of my life." The man who had almost froze to death with you replies, his name you discovered is John. 

Their son (or at least Abigail's son, you weren't sure if John is the father; the two of them argue quite nastily about it whenever the boy sleeps), who you eventually figure out is named Jack, has been silent for awhile. Though when you hear a rustling of fabric -- small hands readjusting their grip in his mother's thick skirts to keep warm, you know he's still in the room. 

The door is thrown open before Abigail can respond and you hope no one notices how sharply you flinch. 

"Still alive there Marston?" Comes a new voice to accompany the freezing draft that's let in, one you don't recognize but still sounds familiar somehow. 

"It'll take more than a couple of wolves and a snow storm to get me out of the picture." John immediately shoots back, tone defensive -- completely losing the softness it courted when speaking with Abigail.

"Yeah, I reckon you could find a simpler excuse to cut and run again than that." 

"Arthur!" Abigail snaps and you realize that this isn't playful banter between friends, its a roomful of predators bearing their teeth at each other, "I will not have you speak of that again!" 

"My apologies Abigail, I just haven't forgiven the fool as quickly as you have." 

"He _is_ a fool you're right but he's my fool, he's Jack's fool, he's _ours_. And I'll have you remember he was your fool too once, you were _brothers_ \--,"

"Abigail stop!" John cuts her off in nearly a shout, the rough texture in his voice a sign that dangerous emotional territory was just breached. 

Before anyone can say anything more though the door opens again. 

"Everyone get packing, we're moving out tomorrow at first light!" It's a woman's voice, older -- a bit scratchy, kind of reminded you of a vulture's caw, "Miss Roberts you organize John and Jack's things, Arthur you come help me ready this woman for traveling."

"We're taking her with us? Has she even woken up yet?" The man you now know to be Arthur asks but doesn't argue. 

"Unfortunately yes, Hosea and Dutch's orders. And I believe she's had bursts of consciousness so we'd be killin' her if we left her here." 

"Doesn't Dutch think she's an O'Driscoll spy? Why would he want to keep any more of them rats alive, we already got one why keep another?" 

"I don't know Mr. Morgan, if it was up to me I'd shoot them both and be done with it."  

Your heart freezes over as you realize with mounting horror that they are talking about you.

A _spy?_ What the actual  _fuck?_  

You petrify with fear as two pairs of footsteps, one quick and determined and the other heavy with intent and the promise of violence, approaches you. If you woke up now it would be obvious that you were listening in and it would make them trust you even less than they apparently already did. Who automatically assumed a naked lost woman on a frozen mountaintop was a spy? Who were these people?

"If you wouldn't mind moving her to the ground while I take apart this cot that would be a great help Mr. Morgan." 

"Why do we need the cot?" 

"Bill wants it. Says he can use it to torture the two O'Driscolls on when we get to warmer country." 

Your blood runs cold at that before solidifying into ice as big hands grab you, manhandling you like you are a cheap rag doll, and hauling you up into the air. You force yourself to remain limp in his arms as he holds you bridal style, trying not to cower and flinch as you're not so gently adjusted in this man's grip. You're ready to be lowered back down again presumably on the floor but you remain firmly in Arthur's arms. But this does little to pull you from your worries. 

Now they're talking about torture?

You hadn't thought your terror could get any worse but you were oh so wrong. 

While Arthur is warm, a great furnace wrapped in what feels like thick coats, it does nothing to comfort you. In fact tears line your closed eyelids and slip out of the corners of your lashes. The physicality of being in the arms of someone who wanted -- or at least didn't care if you were tortured, left here in the cold, or died made everything too real. Made the fear that has plagued you since you woke in that silent forest naked and alone crumble what little control you had maintained in the mock safety of the Marston family cabin.  

"She's shakin'," You hear Arthur murmur under his breath, tone as deep and vast as the bottom of the sea, sounding like he hadn't meant to speak out loud. Then deliberately, "She's shakin' and cryin'," And when that doesn't get him a response, "Miss Grimshaw?" 

He sounds unsure, edging on panic ironically enough. Probably just ready to be rid of the discomfort your display of manifested terror is giving him. 

"She'll be fine Mr. Morgan, she's just weak is all. It's better this way anyway, we'll get more outta her faster when she comes to enough to interrogate." 

"She seemed real scared when she was awake," Abigail intercedes from what sounds like the opposite side of the room, "I don't think she's a spy." 

"Well then if she's not a spy for the O'Driscolls then she is most definitely one of their whores." Arthur tightens his grip on you at this, "Who runs around as naked as the day they were born like that? There was probably an O'Driscoll camp near by," There's a short sound of hollow metal being dragged across the floor, "And she wandered too far away. There is no one else living up here, where else would she have come from?" 

John mumbles something about you then but you don't hear it as you spiral yet again into another full fledged panic attack.  

"She's really breathin' hard are you sure she's alright?" Arthur says with a quality of alarm in his voice you don't have the mental capacity to analyze right now.

"Mr. Morgan I really don't understand why you're so bothered, let her suffer, easier to break her when she wakes." There is a tense pause, the sound of rusted metal joints dislocating and folding, then, "Alright, toss her on the floor there. We'll move her to the cart that will be carrying the other O'Driscoll in the morning." 

You can't help but tense a little as Arthur starts to shift under you, but instead of tossing you to the floor as this Miss Grimshaw had suggested, Arthur sets you down with thundering gentleness. It shocks you so much that it brings you out of your panic for a second, wrenches you so swiftly from what you believe your reality to be. Your chest heaves out a  _sob_ as your head, cradled like fractured glass in his wide calloused palms, is laid carefully down atop the worn wood of the floorboards after the rest of your body has been transferred from his arms. His fingers linger a second on either side of your face near the cliffs of your jaw, and it makes you sob again. He withdraws all touch from you at the sound like you had burned him, like he thought he might be the reason for your pain. And in a way he is, but largely the universe is at fault. 

Time traveling is not of mortal grace, something Greater is to blame for this. Since you don't know what or who is responsible, you curse them all, curse everything you can think of. Because as you sob and shiver on the floor in some cabin in the middle of nowhere surrounded by dangerous strangers in a time you have slowly come to realize is not your own, you arrive at the notion that survival is least likely. But damn it all, you will survive. Out of  _spite_ you will survive. And heaven help the force that tries to keep you from success.

 

* * *

 

It's the middle of the night and the people in your cabin -- John, Abigail, and Jack -- are all asleep trying to get some rest before traveling tomorrow. You manage to find a full waterskin by a few other pouches in front of the fireplace, and you down the entire thing in one go, not realizing how thirsty you were. The next thing you scavenge for in the dark room is food. Sick and tired of feeling like you'll collapse any second you silently grab one of the pouches and find that inside is what you assume is the leftover salted venison you over heard the men called Dutch and Hosea arguing about a day or so earlier. You're not sure how long you were under after passing out on the mountain, but judging by the weakness in your body more than long enough. You recoil at the taste of the jerky but gnaw at it anyway, giving up on chewing it half through and just swallowing it whole out of desperation to nourish yourself. 

You're a bit shocked you haven't woken the small family (if that's what you could call them) yet, but you don't question your luck as you move as quietly as your uncoordinated body will allow after being still for so long. You scan the black night once you crack the door open enough to get a good look and struggle to see anything. After a few minutes of letting your eyes adjust you spot a row of horses hitched to posts farther down across the main road. They're huddled together for warmth, a few blankets thrown over their backs to protect from the cold. There's only one that is saddled though, its a giant black horse that seems to be the most awake too. It's odd that its saddled but again, you don't question your luck you just hope its a snowball effect and things will just keep working in your favor. It's the least you're owed for the level of fuckery you've had to endure these past few days. 

You wait another beat before slipping out as quietly as possible and streaking across the path to the horses. All the rest seem to ignore you except the saddled black one that raises its great head and snorts a warning at you. To be fair you know close to nothing about horses but you do know that this one will definitely pitch a loud fit if you don't calm it down. You quickly come to the realization that you don't know how to calm a horse down and the momentum you were running on to escape wobbles dangerously under your feet. You want to cry in frustration and fear but your body is too dehydrated to produce actual tears, so instead your sinuses burn like Satan himself took up residence in your tearducts, stirring the headache you have been nursing these past few days into a full fledged migraine. Also even with the night so still, the chill in the air is deathly cold as it pierces right through your shift and skirts. With a growing sense of dread you know you won't last out there like this, whether you manage to steal a horse or not. You also don't know where you are and where to go if you did escape. Your plan disintegrates like cotton candy in warm water as you once again are slapped across the face by the reality of your situation: you are well and truly fucked and you are a prisoner with no hope of immediate escape. 

You need to be smarter. 

The intimidating black horse gives a harsh whinny as you slowly approach it. The saddlebags attached to its side look quite full and you figure are worth checking before retreating back inside. You know nothing about picking locks or what not, but you figure it might not hurt to snatch anything you could find that might provide you an out when you're inevitably treated like a spy or prisoner or worse starting tomorrow. You don't think you can get away with faking unconsciousness any longer. If the situation gets dire enough, anything be it hairpin or bottlecap could be the one thing keeping you alive. You'd watched enough of those survivalist shows to at least understand that. 

"It's a yeet or be yeeted world, and I refuse to be the latter." You declare mostly to yourself but also to the horse that's started picking its front hooves up in mini rears and stomping them back into the snow, clearly pissed that you're not backing off.

 

* * *

 

Arthur concludes after a couple of beats that the woman had indeed spoken some form of English, but he can not for the sorry life of him derive any coherent meaning from what she just said. He watches her debate with herself in the middle of the dark courtyard, absolutely sure she is not an O'Driscoll spy. She had completely missed Arthur leaning against the wall just inside the makeshift kitchen directly facing the posted horses. She stands not six feet from him and is totally unaware he's there.

Some spy.

Arthur has always liked night shifts when its his turn to take watch, and observing her trying to approach Sabine, who is seconds away from alerting the entire camp that something is wrong, is the most entertaining thing Arthur has witnessed in a long time. When he finally cops a glance at her profile in the hopes of gathering some clue as to what in God's name she thinks she's going to accomplish, he eventually puts together that she's  _apparently_ attempting to steal from his saddlebags. Arthur is dizzy with perplexsion and amusement as he watches her struggle to hush Sabine who's nickering louder and louder at her in warning, tossing her head and snorting hard through her nostrils as she paws the ground and flicks her tail -- all signs that a horse is about to teach you a goddamn lesson in personal space. The aggressive streak his mare has on top of the fact that she's green (freshly broke) and still wild in spirit only makes this situation worse, Arthur knows no amount of panicked shushing is going to get rid of that look in his girl's eye. He's tempted to let Sabine bite and or kick the shit out of the woman but something in the way she grapples for the buckles of his saddlebags -- frantic and desperate -- convinces Arthur to confront her instead of leaving her to the mercy of his mare. 

"Ma'am," He says as he heaves himself out of his causal lean against the wall and steps out into the open, announcing his presence to her and trying to keep the curl in his voice that drips with his amusement neutral and intimidating instead.

The woman jumps like she's been struck by lightening, and before she's even turned all the way around to face him, an apology is ripping its way past her lips.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes no maybe so? Idk this chapter kind of came together in a weird way so forgive me if it kind of read weird too xxx


	3. Colter II

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I've taken some artistic license with this. Sometimes I will stray from canon and some of the dialogue will not be the game script verbatim. I'm not changing core aspects of the plot/characters we know and love, I just wanted to enhance or elaborate on certain aspects of the story so its told the way I would like and not just a copy of the original. I really wanted to make you feel like you are part of the story, woven in as an integral piece of the world instead of just dropped on the surface. If that makes any sense lol. Anyway enjoy !!

"Sorry!" You say on a choked inhale, air struggling to get past your heart that's lodged itself up into the back of your throat. 

The apology was reflex if you are being honest, along with the harsh startle your body gave when you whipped around towards the voice.  

"What are you doin' there miss?" A man smeared in shadow asks in a dangerously neutral tone, taking a few ominous steps forward as he does so. 

While you can't make out much of him, just a black silhouette against the slightly lighter black canvas of the night, your heart stutters over a beat or two as you recognize his voice. This is Arthur. This realization brings you absolutely no comfort. He justifies this feeling as he crosses his arms tight against his broad chest when you hesitate to answer right away. Your spine locks against your shivering, pulling your insides in opposite directions and straining the muscles in your neck.  

"I'm --," You grit your teeth at the pain in your head and the scratch in your throat and decide that you don't have the capability to lie (well) right now, "I was trying to steal from these saddlebags." You surrender with a hitch in your voice. 

"I see," He indulges in a slow drawl, then after a long punishing beat of silence, "And how's that workin' out for ya?" 

"Not well." You reply as you hug your arms around yourself, not being able to stand the cold and the fear at the same time.

"Yeah, Sabine here," You just make out Arthur sending a stiff nod in the aggravated horse's direction, "Tends to get possessive of her personal space."

"I noticed." You say. 

"Well," He huffs, a strange curl to his tone making something in the back of your head stomp its foot, "How do you reckon we go from here?" 

"Please don't kill me." You immediately rush, not above begging for your life. He just caught you trying to steal and he had already been talking about _torturing_ you earlier so yeah, definitely not above begging. 

Arthur seems to falter as he hears the genuine fear wobbling in your voice. You're not sure how you sense such a subtle shift in his approach to the conversation but you do as he uncrosses his arms and clasps his hands together in front of his hips, the movement loud in the twilight, before clearing his throat,

"Won't be doin' that just yet miss."

"Yet?" Your chest constricts and stars fall from the sky, swirling in your vision and making your head feel like air. That venison jerky you ate whole earlier tumbles like a brick in your stomach, and you regret eating anything at all as bile fills your mouth. 

"Yes, it would be a waste of my effort to kill you so soon after savin' you."

"You were the one that saved me?" You whisper on empty lungs as the stars begin to collect around his outline.

A streak of bold moonlight cuts through the thick overcast and slants across his figure, highlighting small silver slivers of him -- the rim of his hat, the swell of a cheekbone, the rounding of a muscled shoulder; a mystery amidst his own galaxy. 

"Miss?" 

You feel yourself falling as the stars around him start to spin.

_I'm getting really sick of fainting_ , you think before the black swallows you whole. 

 

* * *

 

"Goddamn it!" Arthur curses as he lurches forward and catches her just before she crumples completely into the snow.

Once he's adjusted her in his arms, he finds himself frozen and unable to move. Holding her close in an ironically graceful dip, the light of the moon whispers across her face. It tangles in her lashes and kisses her brow, runs down her nose and lounges on the soft curve of her upper lip. Arthur is struck by her, again, and stunned in the silent night. The beauty of her, obscure and poignant and unnameable like all things in nature are, seizes Arthur and he --

He  _hates_ her because of it. Hates the softness it encourages in him.  

The anger that protects him from all his vulnerabilities gathers up around him like wildfire, burning that softness in him to ash and charring him into a familiar numbness. A numbness he feels when he beats a starving man for debt money, or shoots a noncomplying witness who was going to send the law on the gang, or sees helplessness eat up the good in John's eyes, or watches Jack collect stray wildflowers for his mother, or the gentle pinch around the skin of Hosea's eyes whenever he smiles at Arthur -- 

Arthur grits his teeth against the hollowing in his chest and hoists the woman fully up into his arms. He walks carefully but quickly back to the Marston cabin, trying not to jostle her too much as he would hate to have her wake. Why is it that this woman always ends up unconscious in his arms? Arthur's not even carried _Mary_ this many times. His brain short circuits at the thought of Mary -- oil pouring over open flame -- and nearly grunts out loud with the effort he puts into shoving all things Mary related back down the dark hole it slithered up from. 

The woman's body burns like a live wire against him through the layers of his clothing, the memory of her naked skin pressed to his making his blood boil. He shoulders open the door and lays the lady down in her place by the weak fire. Arthur snatches his arms out from under her when she's fully transferred to the floor, slowly backing away like she could wake any second and attack him.

"Hi Uncle Arthur,"

Arthur jumps slightly at Jack's small voice whispering at him from a couple paces away. The boy is kneeling at the head of John's cot, both John and Abigail are asleep.

"Go back to bed Jack, we'll be traveling tomorrow and you don't want to be tired." Arthur chastises through a tight throat, wanting to exit the room and put space between him and the feeling tearing up his insides as soon as possible. Because absurdly, he feels...he feels  _fragile_ right now. Hot and shaky and exhausted and fragile. He _hates_ it, hates _her_ for kicking him into this familiar spiral. Hates that nowadays he can be so easily sucked into it in the first place. 

"Okay," Jack answers as Arthur quietly leaves the cabin.

Arthur doesn't know why he doesn't immediately return to his post once he steps out into the snow, doesn't know why he sneaks a glance back inside through the frost fogged window. But what he sees sends deep cracks through the fist of stone that lives in the bone cage of his chest instead of a heart. Jack remains kneeling by his father's side and slowly begins reaching one tiny hand towards John's head. The moment crystallizes and Arthur can't move, can't breathe. The boy  _shakes_ as the tips of two of his small fingers graze the bruised skin of John's face, the side without the bandages. Jack's fingers hover after the first pet, and when John doesn't stir Jack bites his lip with child-like concentration and lowers his whole hand with earth-shattering tenderness to press against John's cheek. 

Time unpauses and Arthur wrenches himself away from the window, gasping around the devastation in his chest as he drags himself back to his post by the horses. The cold night cloaks him, trying to put out the flames as Arthur stands there unable to escape the riot of emotion wrecking havoc on what's left of his soul. The stars whisper to each other above the clouds about humans and their talent for self-destruction while the moon looks on, ruler of the lonely, and is only sad.  

 

* * *

 

You awake with a startle and a gasp, sitting bolt upright from your place on the floor.

A sharp twang sings through your body and you try to bite off your shout of pain. It takes a moment for the hurt to finish rolling through you, and your body to settle enough so you could try and focus. Once you do get a grip you see that you're back in the cabin, and it still seems to be night time. You don't know how long ago your unfortunate encounter with that man Arthur was, but you thank any and all deities that may be listening that you're not dead.

You figure there's not much you can do right now to immediately aid yourself, but that doesn't stop you from planning. You need to be smarter and being smarter starts with gathering your wits and getting your shit together. No more fainting (if you could help it), no more escaping on a whim, no more naive honesty. You need to adapt and you needed to do it now. Tomorrow would most likely determine your fate and you refused to give fate the chance to fuck you over even more than it already has. Falling asleep is out of the question as every worry and fret piles higher and higher only to bury you deeper and deeper. You give a small start when a tiny voice clears its throat. 

"You know," The young boy murmurs to you from across the room, "When I have trouble sleeping I count my Mama's breaths."  His mother (Abigail, was it?) is curled around him tight, sitting with her back against the wall, her cheek squished against the ledge of the man's -- John, you remember -- cot, and her arms wrapped securely around the boy. "If...if you want, you can count her breaths too." 

You recognize that he is offering you something precious, a tiny jewel sparkling in the dark room, and it lightens the horror of the past however many days you've been here. 

"Thank you, um," You blank on his name.

"Jack." He provides quietly.

"Jack, thank you Jack. I just might." 

Jack gives you a cautious half-smile before closing his eyes and snuggling deeper into his mother's arms. After you've fried your brain to a crisp with worry you eventually try to rest. For a time you do actually start to count Abigail's sleeping breaths, thinking it can't hurt to try. When that doesn't work though you try to count John's, then even little Jack's. All of this does nothing but expand your hearing, making you hyper aware of every insignificant sound: the wind howling through the frozen town, the stray creak of brittle wood, the muted crackle of a weak fire in the next room over. It all pushes in on you, suffocating you with paranoia.

When you can't stand it any longer, you jerk your eyes open and quietly but swiftly stand up. Since going outside would be pointless and stupid (as you hazard Arthur or someone of this gang might be out there), your gaze targets the door connecting this room with the adjoining one. You close the short distance to it and carefully turn the rusted knob. As you open it slowly in the hopes of making the least amount of noise, you wince when it protests with a loud creak.  _Fuck it,_ you think before yanking the damn thing open wide enough so you can quickly slip through. You're halfway into the next room when you stop cold.

There, sitting hunched before the fireplace, is the large bulk of a man who's  _cleaning_   _a shotgun_. He turns at the sound of your intrusion and sees you frozen in the doorway. You can't make out much of his face in the dark room and he doesn't speak so you can't identify him by voice, so you both just petrify into statues.

One beat.

Two beats.

Three beats.

Then --

He silently hefts his gaze back down to his gun, effectively shattering the moment but not cutting the tension. That certainly wasn't an invitation to come in but it also wasn't a hostile demand to leave. So, naturally, you remain fixed in the doorway torn clean in half with indecision. Most of his back is facing you so only a slice of his profile is visible, and even that is blurred by the orange light of the small fire flickering in the wooden hearth in front of him. 

"What you want?" His words fire like gunshots into the space between you, mirth curling like smoke out of the corners of his mouth as the air in the room becomes charged.

The baritone of his voice resonates in your memory... 

Arthur?

How is it you keep running into him? Another habit that needs to be broken. 

"Thank you," 

You jump at your own voice, surprising yourself, and he stiffens before ceasing his cleaning entirely. Your heart pounds between your lungs and blood roars in your ears. _Why did you speak, why did you speak, why did you speak --_

"For, for saving my life." You clarify, your voice tight as it fights its way out of your locked jaw and heavy with a gratitude so dense your tongue fumbles around the syllables. 

Arthur doesn't reply at first, just jerks back into methodically wiping down the long barrel of his gun after a moment or two of silence. 

"You're welcome." He says eventually, tone hard and carefully blank, and its what you had been waiting for apparently because as soon as the words leave his mouth you're slinking back into the room you came from.  

Your heart doesn't stop racing even as you lie back down in front of the fireplace and watch the dim embers flicker, even as you try to listen for Arthur in the next room, even as you slip into an uneasy nightmare-plagued sleep. 

 

* * *

  

This time you awake to your wrists being not-so-gently tied together. 

A man with a mean glint in his eye and a cruel smile hovering over you is the first thing you see when your eyes shoot open. He's talking down at you with loud harsh words that try to stuff themselves into your ears at the same time, all sharp edges and poisoned corners as they tumble around in your head. 

"Bill get her tied to the wagon beside the other O'Driscoll and then we'll be ready to set out." Says a voice you've heard once before. A man with black shoulder length curls and dressed like he's straight out of some Victorian drama leans into your vision over the shoulder of who you now know to be Bill. His gaze is piercing and the authority in his voice is unmissable. His name evades you though as you instead struggle to grasp all that's happening. 

It takes you a second to realize what the man had said, and before the increasingly familiar grip of fear can truly settle in your bones, Bill wrenches you up to stand on your feet and shoves you out the closed door. The pain of smashing front first through the door, the shock of the cold, the light of the morning, and the noise of people and horses bustling about hits you all at once, stunning you into a stand still before Bill pushes you forward again. You almost collapse into the snow at the force of it, still infuriatingly weak and still fighting to keep up on the current situation. Bill grabs the scruff of fabric at the back of your neck, scoffing his aggravation at your incompetence, and proceeds to _drag_ you over to one of the wagons being readied for departure that are lined up on the main road. 

"O'Driscoll _whore_!" Someone hisses at you as you're wrenched kicking and screaming down the line towards the back.

You're too disoriented and focused on trying to maintain your footing in the snow to see who it was. Though the scratch in the woman's voice sounded familiar, almost like a vulture's caw.

"Bill is all that violence really necessary?" Comes another voice you think you've heard before, tone a bit brittle with age or maybe its just the cold. You're too busy trying to twist yourself free to look up to the source of the voice -- a man who's perched on the driver's bench of the wagon behind the one you've stopped in front of. 

"Dutch said she was an O'Driscoll spy, possibly one of their whores, I'm treatin' her accordin' to her station!" Is the attempted justification of your abuser, then you're yanked hard by your hair so your back is forced to press against his front, "Makin' you squeal will be so easy," Bill hushes into your ear.

You don't have time to register the pain in your scalp because his foul hot breath pours over your cheek and collects in the shell of your ear along with the rub of his course full beard, making your stomach drop in violent disgust. A revolted sound half way between a shout and a gag rips its way out of your lips and he laughs at the noise, shoving you off him to crash into the wooden lip of the back of the wagon. A scuffed up man shivers in the snow beside you, hands bound like yours are but tied to the back of the wagon like livestock. You both just stare at each other wide eyed and scared as Bill manhandles you into more rope and more knots as he also ties you to the wagon. He cackles and hits your behind hard, promising you something you wish you hadn't heard before walking off.

_'The pleasure of breakin' you for my own is gonna be so much fun.'_

Incapable of anything but choking on your panic, you flinch as the rub of the harsh rope against the skin of your wrists -- twin shackles of pressure and heat that only tighten further as you try to rip yourself free -- begins to burn. 

"Don't yank or you'll make the ropes tighter," You jump as the man beside you murmurs urgently under his breath, "I think this will be a long journey and you'll want to maintain feelin' in your hands or you could lose 'em." 

Lose your hands? Long journey? Your breathing cranks into hyperventilation and you feel yourself spiraling -- 

"Hey! I-Its okay, um my name's Kieran. Whats yours?"

You look at the man -- Kieran, and try to get yourself to take his bait, try to allow yourself to be reeled away from your panic. Smarter, you need to be smarter.

"Y/n, my name is Y/n." You force out in a hoarse voice between gasping breaths, desperately searching for some stillness in yourself amidst all the chaotic noise of your fear. 

"Y/n, that's a nice name. It's good to meet you even if it is under unfortunate circumstances." 

You can't manage a response but Kieran looks like he doesn't mind, just offers you a grimace you assume is meant to be a smile. But his effort to calm you is in vain, because your panic rockets back up when Kieran  _cowers_  as someone walks past him towards the wagon parked behind you. The man responsible for this reaction is tall, has a build on him that displays a kind of packed strength that contains true physical ability. Though something about his shape -- in the way he moves, sparks an ember of familiarity in your mind. 

"Whatchu lookin' at?" The man challenges and stops dead in his tracks as he catches you staring, his shaded eyes lock with yours under the dark brim of his hat. His shoulders hold a tension that speaks to an intimacy with violence and his hands are fisted in great balls of bone and muscle. Its his voice that hits you like a thunder clap.

_Arthur_. 

Making use of the daylight, you quickly pick out a few defining aspects of him to match to the Arthur in your memory then divert your gaze down and away, not wanting to risk his wrath. This is apparently the right thing to do because as Arthur dismisses the both of you with a grunt and heaves himself up onto the driver's perch of the wagon behind you beside an older looking man, Kieran shuffles closer to your side and warns,

"If there is anyone you don't want to piss off, its him."  

"Yeah?" 

"Yeah." 

It probably makes you a horrible person but you're glad you aren't alone, glad that someone else is a prisoner too -- that there's at least one person who doesn't want to kill you. And if Kieran is claiming Arthur to be the worst of them, even worse than that Bill person, you think that maybe surviving this situation isn't going to be something you're capable of. 

There's some clamoring around and shouts between the wagons as everyone begins mounting up, but it all blurs for you. You shake from the panic and the fear and the cold and the hunger...you go to a numb place. One where your senses dull, your mind blanks, and emptiness yawns in your chest -- eating up everything in its path. You dissociate hard because its the only way you can cope. When reigns are snapped and cries of ' _Onward!'_ are released into the fridge air, all the wagons jerk stiffly into motion, you along with them, and your journey begins. 

 

* * *

 

Arthur watches the two O'Driscolls struggling through the snow behind the wagon in front of him with a knot in his stomach. It was Micah's idea to have them walk tied to the wagon and not just sit secured in the back. 

The wagon isn't going fast but its the terrain that's the problem. The prisoners first try to walk in the deep tracks the wagon impresses into the snow, but their ropes aren't quite long enough to allow them that far back so they end up just getting yanked forward. Then when they abandon this tactic and just simply try to keep up with the wagon by breaking their own path behind it through the knee deep snow, they tire -- fast. They inevitably begin to slow, their ropes loosing their slack, and they are once again pulled forward. There really isn't a happy medium, and no doubt all this dragging and yanking worsens the blood circulation of their bound wrists. Bill had tied them real tight and with short leads. Unnecessarily short in Arthur's opinion but whatever, he's too tired to bring it up and he figures that was probably Bill's intention anyway.

Exhaustion consumes Arthur as the caravan trudges down the mountain, the cold a great heavy iron blanket covering him from head to toe. Dutch has been running him ragged these past few weeks -- with fair reason -- but still, Arthur's gotten maybe a total of twenty-four hours of sleep broken up in small chunks throughout the past week alone. He worries he'll fall asleep at the reigns but is thankful Hosea chose to sit shotgun and is currently demanding to drive. Arthur grunts but relents the reigns, sore from the non-stop cold, lack of rest, lack of proper nourishment, and having helped Javier and Charles hack all the left over ice that froze the joints of the wagons off right before departing. Because while the storm did break and the sun had shown for the first time in days, it didn't mean the snow was going to thaw anytime soon. 

"If you feel yourself fallin' asleep make sure to lean towards me and not off the wagon." Hosea says with that familiar teasing humor of his but Arthur can clearly hear the note of concern in his voice. 

"I'd crush you if I fell asleep on you old man, better to fall clean outta the wagon and risk a scrape or two then kill ya tryna sleep." 

Hosea gives a wheezing chuckle at that and the sound loosens a darkness from Arthur's heart he hadn't known he'd been baring. It lets warmth into his chest and shakes the stitches pulling his eyebrows together out too. Arthur is grateful for Hosea's attempt to lighten his mood, knowing Hosea himself has been sour this past week, as sour as Arthur's ever seen him. He's also never heard Hosea argue with Dutch the way he has been before. It worries Arthur, it worries Arthur greatly. 

"Well crush me then, can't have you breakin' bones --," Hosea suddenly pulls the horses up short as the O'Driscoll woman in front of them stumbles to her knees, letting out a cry as she's dragged for a moment, before forcing herself back up. Hosea lets the two prisoners get a few extra paces ahead before encouraging the horses forward again and continuing, "Once we get down into warmer country I'll make an herb paste you can put in some hot water. Drinkin' it should help you recover."

"I ain't hurt." Arthur bites out on reflex. 

"You ain't well neither." Hosea immediately shoots back, accompanied by a significant look he sends at Arthur's profile. 

Arthur sighs and surrenders the argument, finding he could never win them against Hosea anyway. That was due largely to the fact that Hosea was mostly always right, but Arthur chooses not to think too much on that as his shoulders slump forward and his back aches something fierce. Also the base of his skull has been throbbing since yesterday but he figures that's also due to his exhaustion. 

"Bill shouldn't have made 'em walk like this," Arthur hears Hosea mutter as the woman falls again, "No point in it. Will only slow us down." 

"I don't think she's a spy," Arthur admits as he rubs his face with his gloved hands, sniffing hard once he's done to keep his nose from running. 

"No?" 

Arthur shakes his head and scratches his beard, the skin under the thickening stubble dry and cracked from the cold. 

"Caught her tryin' to steal from my saddlebags last night. I stood six goddamn feet from 'er, didn't notice me at all." Arthur elaborates with a scoff, "Plus she  _apologized_ when I caught her. She ain't no thief."

"Why were you up?" Hosea questions with that fatherly fierceness of his, completely ignoring the rest of what Arthur said. 

"Dutch put me on watch." Arthur shrugs.

Hosea is silent at this and when Arthur turns to look at him, Hosea has a rather hardened expression on his face, 

"He should have let you rest." 

"Ah don't worry about me, I'm fine." 

Hosea doesn't validate Arthur's words with a response, only frowns deeper as the O'Driscoll man does his best to encourage the woman to keep going as she struggles to stand from _another_ fall.  

"You think she's an O'Driscoll?" Arthur questions in the hopes of distracting Hosea from his thoughts, hating the dark look molding his face into a mask of muted ire. 

Hosea only gives a noncommittal hum and continues brooding. Arthur realizes why Dutch always says he reminds him so much of Hosea, they have the exact same brooding face. Arthur clears his throat and returns his gaze forward knowing Hosea wants to not be bothered for a bit. A few beats of silence throb by and Arthur realizes Charles has been awfully quiet (not that that isn't normal for Charles but still). 

"How you doin' back there Charles!" Arthur calls as he turns in his seat to face the back of the wagon where Charles is sitting, huddled and wrapped around himself tight, on one of the barrels. 

Charles levels him with a look that makes Arthur immediately regret asking. Clearly Charles is miserable just like everyone else. Feeling a bit sheepish, Arthur is about to turn back around when Charles' face lightens out of its exasperation as he takes a breath to speak.

"I'm doing alright Arthur."   

Arthur nods, "How's that hand?" 

"Better. It'll heal a lot faster once we get out of the cold." 

"Good." Arthur grunts before swiveling forward, missing the rare small smile Charles gives Arthur's back at his concern. 

 

* * *

 

You can't feel your legs. 

At first it was just your feet, but as you continue to trudge through the deep snow the numbing feeling begins to crawl upwards. Maybe its a good thing you can't feel them, they probably would be aching just as insufferably as the rest of your body is. You don't know how much longer you can keep going for, you hope its long enough, but the snow is getting thinner and thinner so you figure once the snow is gone things will get easier. 

Wrong. You are so wrong. 

Since karma or fate or whatever is responsible for you is a complete asshole, you quickly realize how close you are to truly losing your shit. Once you leave the mountain feeling eventually returns to your legs as you travel into warmer and warmer areas, and the pain is _excruciating_. You haven't eaten anything but a slice of stale venison jerky, you've been on your feet for god knows how long, you're weaker than you've ever been, and you're surrounded by dangerous people who all want to kill you. Your panic is like a new limb at this point, constantly there living in the back of your head never sleeping just always on. Like a switch you can't turn off. And it drains you, drains you of everything you are. You've forgotten what its like to not be exhausted, what its like to be strong and safe and happy. 

There has been a pretty constant stream of small talk happening in the wagon behind you, but you're still so distant you don't have the capability to pay attention to what they're saying. You're in too much pain to even try.

You hear the water before you see it. Kieran begins wrapping his hands around the lead of his rope, pulling him just short of the wagon. He nods at you to do the same,

"The river looks deep and the current looks strong, you don't want your rope to snap if you fall."

Before you can ask why, you catch a glance around the wagon at the deep river flowing towards the unmistakable roar of a waterfall. The wagons cross single file a yard or two away from the drop off, the horses snorting and neighing their protest at the force of the current. Your attention spikes like a plucked wire, all your nerve endings zinging to life as your wagon nears the water. You copy Kieran and frantically wrap your wrists in the excess rope, shaking as you do. Your panic ebbs like a tide in your brain, drawing back to crest in a tidal wave as you are finally forced into the cold water. 

It's deeper than you thought. Much deeper and much stronger. The current takes your feet out from under you almost immediately.   

You open your mouth to scream but your lungs flood with water. Kieran can't do much but shout for you as your head goes under. You fight to gain footing, and once you do your head bursts through the surf with a gasp and you clamp your hands around the splintered lip of the wagon, holding on for dear life as the wagon trudges on. 

 

* * *

 

Arthur's breath had stopped when he saw her go under.

"Careful of the rocks Arthur!" Hosea calls to him, snapping Arthur's attention back on driving.

The wagon jerks in the water as the left rear wheel crunches over what felt like a cluster of rocks.

By the time Arthur looks back up, the wagon in front of them is out of the water and on the otherside of the bank, and the woman sounds like she's coughing up a lung.

"Get us outta the stream!" Hosea then orders when he notices Arthur's attention has been stolen once again, "You gotta keep us movin', but _calm_ \--," 

Arthur interrupts him with a grunt and guides the wagon out of the river, they get maybe a foot onto dry land before a resounding crack echos up against the ravine and the wagon collapses. 

"Ah shit!" Arthur curses as he pulls the horses up short. 

"All right, let's take a look," Hosea sighs in a very obvious tone of exasperation. 

The line of wagons halt, people shouting their concerns. 

"You okay?" Javier calls from the wagon in front of them. 

"Everything alright back there?" Bill says almost at the same time from beside Javier. 

"Does everything look alright?" Arthur snarks, voice sharpened by sarcasm and aggravation at being the reason the line is held up as Hosea, Charles, and him all hop down to assess the damage. 

The two tied O'Driscolls eye the situation from over their shoulders, huffing and shaking in exhaustion. 

"Well, what's going on?" Javier says from his perch on the driver's bench, swiveled around to face them and squinting to see what all the fuss is. 

"I broke the goddamn wheel!" Comes Arthur's tempered reply, gesturing to the wheel that's rolled off a bit as he walks to the back of the wagon.

"Alright, let's get it fixed." Hosea concedes as he waves Charles over.

"You need help?" Javier offers as Bill rolls his eyes at the entire scene and faces forward. 

"I reckon we can handle it!" Hosea assures as he makes his way to the back of the wagon, "Alright Charles you and me hold the thing up, while you try to put the wheel back on Arthur." 

As Arthur picks the wheel up and begins rolling it back over to the wagon he says, 

"You still strong enough to hold up a wagon?" He phrases it like a jab, but he really does want to know if it'll hurt Hosea. They could always switch.  

"Shut up." Hosea snaps with a strange opposing gentleness, a special tone he always seems to use when he's being short with Arthur. 

"I'm just sayin," Arthur grumbles as he positions the wheel onto its knob. 

"Well, say less." Hosea grunts as he and Charles lift the wagon with the strength of their legs and their lower backs. 

 

* * *

 

You fight the whole body collapse you feel simmering just under your skin and hollowing out your bones. This is the longest you've been still for who knows how long, and you're beginning to wonder if you'll be able to move again. If you have the strength to take even one more step. There's grunts and the sound of muscles bashing against wood as your wagon jerks into motion again.

"We'll meet you back at camp!" Calls the voice of one of your drivers, his accent sounds Hispanic though you can't place which country. 

"Alright!" Someone shouts back as your body locks up in pain in anticipation of moving. 

Your feet are throbbing, your knees feel like snapping, your hips and upper body feel as heavy as stone...how much longer...

 


	4. Horseshoe Overlook I

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the long gap between updates! My life has been nothing short of insane, so thank you for all your continued support and kindness!! Enjoy xxx

 

* * *

  _Horseshoe Overlook_ ~ **May 1899**

* * *

 

The tree Kieran and you are tied to feels like a cheese grater against your back.

Every time you flinch or breathe too heavily the bark chafes against you and its agony. You haven't sat or laid down since the mountain cabins and only a lady who you have learned is called Mary-Beth comes to feed Keiran and you small rips of stale bread or sips of water regularly. She does it quickly and when the least amount of people are watching, but you're grateful for it. It's the first display of genuine kindness you've been shown since...traveling. _Time_ traveling.

Yeah you still haven't come to terms with that.

Most of the camp has come by to take stock of the two of you, some to antagonize and demean while others offer small tokens of food or coffee if you both are looking particularly pitiful that day. Some of the gang have beaten Kieran and to your horror beat you too, some have dropped food just out of your reach, tossed their still lit cigarette buds at your faces, talked to you like you were the worst scum of the earth. You had never been in a situation where nobody... _cared_ , nobody cared what was done to you and everybody relished in your discomfort and pain. These people were _cruel_ , the kind of cruel you read about in history books and news headlines and watched in movies. The kind of cruel you believed you'd never have to experience like your ancestors did.  

"Mercy! Please!" Kieran moans to a passerby, his voice a racket in the quiet foggy morning and effectively wrenching you from your thoughts. 

You try to tamper down the brittleness threatening to shatter your chest and allow your senses to distract you from your fear. The abuse has become so regular you eventually reached a point where you began trying to anticipate their cruelty, desperately trying to find a pattern to it. And in doing so you unintentionally became an expert on these people. At first you started discreetly observing how they treat each other, how each person does their chores, how they act when eating together or singing together. Then you learned each of their names and cataloged their habits, committing every little interaction and detail to memory. You have to know the enemy to defeat them, or in your case simply _survive_ them. Apart from your rapt daily assessment of your captors, there's not much else for you to do other than suffer. Though you choose to do it silently unlike Kieran for you fear if you open your mouth god knows what will come out of it. Plus the second you allow yourself to truly indulge in your fears, is the moment you lose your ability to be present in any given situation and survive it. 

The passerby Kieran is wailing to is a big heavy set man who you've guessed is the camp cook, or something like that. Pearson is what everyone calls him. He is always one of the first to wake, preparing a communal coffee pot which he sets by a fire pit that burns a couple paces in front of Kieran and your tree, and then sets to work on various chores like chopping up fresh game or tanning leather, before starting on a stew of some sort for dinner. The smells of food, actual hearty food, has been the worst torture thus far. You've shit and wet yourself more than you'd care to keep track of and it makes you wish for death more than wading through miles of hip deep snow did. You're constantly terrified your body will shut down without your consent too, rendering you unconscious and unprotected. You hadn't slept a whole week after you were first tied to the tree, and you've barely done so since. It's been about three weeks now.  

Pearson doesn't even look your way, much to Kieran's disappointment, and continues on with his routine deaf and blind like everyone else is to your pain. You don't know why Kieran's trying so hard. I mean yeah you want mercy too but from the welcome you've been given, you seriously doubt begging for scraps of kindness like Kieran is will give you much favor when they do eventually decide what to do with you. You want to think it couldn't hurt to try, but with these kind of people you figure compassion is a tall order to expect of them, let alone ask of them. 

"When is this gonna end!" Kieran cries to no one in particular as he sags against the tree and hangs his head. His defeat you feel in the core of your being.

"Speak! Don't cry, boy." Someone barks suddenly, making you both jump at being addressed directly as it usually foreshadows bruises and split lips. 

A figure appears out of the heavy morning fog like a menacing monster from a story book. Reality soothes your strained imagination when you recognize the man as Arthur as he bends down over the fire to pour himself a cup of coffee. A strange kind of relief twists in your gut -- _at least it's not Bill._  Bill had yet to take up on his promise to 'break you for his own' and 'make you squeal'. 

"Speak. About your gang." Arthur stands to his full height once he's done with the pot, walking lazily over to stand in front of the both of you with all the causal menace of a great predator.

Blowing gently on the hot beverage Arthur settles his weight in one hip before taking a measured sip from the steaming tin cup, his free hand adjusting his ammunition belt that hangs low on his hips. When he brings the cup away from his face and swallows with a soft hum of contentment, Kieran drops his head at the display and starts honest to god sobbing.

"I can't..." Kieran whimpers, his lungs working against the tightness in his throat. 

"Boy _,_ " Arthur warns, violence coloring his eyes as he just stands in front of the both of you and  _sips_. He knows Kieran and you are close to breaking, knows it and relishes in it. 

Fucking bastard. 

"Excuse me?" 

Your heart jumps when you realize you had just said that out loud. Dread promptly drains all the blood from your face. 

"Wanna say that again?" Arthur turns his full attention to you as Kieran heaves around tears that won't come because the both of you are too dehydrated. 

Your first instinct is to cower, to submit, to _survive_ , but there's something severe in the way Arthur makes you feel as he glares at you. A dare. A threat. And now that you've opened your mouth, the first time doing so since the mountains, you can't stop yourself from repeating with perfectly articulated diction,

"Fucking _bastard_." 

"First time you've spoken since the mountains and that's what you choose to say? Aw that's not too smart. Not the language of a _lady,_ is it?"

As you press your lips together your chin gives a violent quiver at the clear implication in his tone. Your eyes grow guarded and your fear swiftly resurfaces and makes itself known by twisting your gut into knots. Arthur locks you into a staring contest you can't escape from. Unfocused, directionless  _rage_  holds court in his eyes, looking like its lived there unchecked for some time -- grown rotten -- though the rest of his expression speaks to a more complex range of emotions you don't know him well enough to decode. Of all the people in the gang, Arthur you know the least about. He's a ghost. He's rarely in camp and when he is his stays are short. This makes Arthur and his actions impossible to predict. Which makes Arthur the most dangerous. What you are able to gather though besides the undercurrent of rage, is an unimaginable need to unleash said rage on anyone or anything. You refuse to be the excuse he needs so you shut up and just stare back, unsure of what you are attempting to prove or accomplish by not looking away. What you gain by _facing_ all that rage. 

"Woah, hold your horses," Comes a new voice as another monster emerges from the fog.

It's the man with curly black shoulder length hair, the one with the authority, the one that everyone seems to listen to without question. Dutch is his name. Your first impression of him pleading in that cabin in the mountains with the man you've remembered to be Hosea, contradicts the swaggering asshole he presents himself as to Kieran and you. Though he's a swaggering asshole to everyone but these people...this gang. _His_ gang. You made sure to pick out the leaders and sort out the hierarchy first.  

Dutch saunters up to stand beside Arthur followed by that horrible wretch Bill.

"It seems the cat has got our friend here's tongues." Dutch continues in a colorful drawl, "I was thinking Mr. Williamson could have a word."

_'The pleasure of breakin' you for my own is gonna be so much fun.'_

You violently shove away the memory of Bill's promise before it shows on your face. You pretend you don't remember the fact that they took the metal cot from the mountain cabin with them, and that Bill is probably itching to stretch you out on it and torture you for information you didn't have.

"You ready to talk boy?" Bill snarls as he gets up in Kieran's face before turning his eye on you and giving you a toothy sneer, showing off all of his yellowing teeth, "What about you? You ready to share?"

"I told you mister," Kieran all but whimpers as his eyes jump between all three men with a desperation you are currently trying to swallow. Bill swings his attention away from you, "I told all of you. I don't know nothin' okay? Th-they ain't no friends of mine. I've just been ridin' with 'em for awhile --,"

"Horseshit!" Bill interrupts with a loud curse, causing you to flinch so harshly against the tree you slice one of your raw fingers on a peeling piece of bark. Arthur almost startles because of how badly you startled. He notes the steady stream of blood dripping down into the grass from your fingers tied behind your back. His eyebrows furrow. He says nothing. "You see we heard that part so how about you tell the truth." 

Bill turns to you for an answer, receives none, then turns to Dutch. 

"Dutch what do you want me to do?" 

" _Hurt_  them so the next time they open their mouths, it is to tell us what is goin' on!" Dutch nearly shouts, causing you to involuntarily shut your eyes and shake as your fear gets the better of you despite your efforts to be brave. They all pick up on your fear now, blatant as it is in the wake of such a threat of violence. "Ah who am I kiddin'," Dutch lowers his voice to almost a hush, tone growing oddly intimate as he pushes his face closer and closer to yours, "O'Driscolls won't open their mouths, unless to tell a lie." 

There's a beat of silence as Dutch eyes you up, then Kieran -- determining how hard it'll be to break you.

"Screw it. Let's just have some fun!" Dutch turns to Bill and scissors his fingers, "Geld him." 

"Oh yeah!" Bill whoops as he bounds off to get whatever torture instrument they have ready. 

Dutch turns to you then as Kieran's panic rockets alongside yours, "Arthur," 

Arthur has been quiet this whole time, so you jolt when he adjusts his weight between his feet at being called upon. He's standing closer to you than you thought. 

"If you'd be so kind," Dutch says as he holds his hand up in a clear gesture for Arthur to back hand you across the face. You can't even look at Arthur, at either of them as Kieran's wails fill your ears and your heartbeat suffocates the breath in your dry swollen throat. Your eyes close again and like when you were young, you somehow hope that if you can't see what is trying to harm you, then it can't see you either.

* * *

 Arthur hesitates.

He hesitates too long and something shifts in Dutch's eyes then. It's small and Arthur doesn't notice because he can't pull his gaze away from the woman shivering in front of him. What kind of a man beats a cowering helpless woman, Arthur thinks to himself.

 _What kind of man would_ ask  _you to do that?_ A tiny voice deep in his mind furthers.

Arthur can feel Dutch scowling at his hesitation, though he remains silent until Bill returns with a pair of hot iron tongs. Dutch and Bill cajole the O'Driscoll boy about losing his balls and Dutch goes on about eunuchs in Rome or something, but Arthur can't do much else but watch the woman try to _breathe_. He hears it wheeze a little whenever she inhales and it makes something in his gut twist uncomfortably. Bill snapping the hot tongs inches from the boy's crotch catches Arthur's attention and he finds himself whiplashing back into the present, not realizing he'd been transported from it in the first place. 

"You sick bastards! What do you want from me!" The O'Driscoll cries out as he squishes himself as far back against the tree as his bindings allow.

"Well, you are going to talk," Dutch says, his bravado restored as Arthur's attention returns to the present at his words, "The only question is now, or after we got these little fellers off?" 

"Okay! Okay! Listen! I know where O'Driscoll's holed up and you're right, he don't like you any more than you like him. He's at Six Point Cabin, I'll take you there! Serious, I don't like him. I mean I like him even less than I like you -- no offense."

Dutch scoffs, "None taken." 

He then puts a hand on Bill's arm, and Williamson lowers the tongs. 

"Okay then partner," Arthur starts, "Why don't you take a few of us up there right now." 

Arthur turns to Dutch and nods, "I got this Dutch. Should be fun!" 

As he moves around Bill and begins to untie the boy, Bill says, "Well what about the whore?" 

Arthur's fingers slip on the knot he'd been working on. He grunts his frustration and pulls his hunting knife out, cutting clean through the ropes in one deft swipe.

Dutch hums to himself, appraising the woman with something entirely wicked gleaming in his eye. 

"Do what you want with her. She might know more...  _personal_ information on Colm than the boy. Women I have found are always harder to break, so don't go easy on her."

Bill cackles at that and starts to move towards the woman and Arthur _can't_ \--

"Dutch," Arthur hears himself interject, chest tight, "Lets leave her alone for now. Brute force ain't gon' work on this one anyway, I can feel it. She seems the smart silent type." 

Arthur sees something foreign swirl in Dutch's irises, something he's never seen there before -- _can't identify_  -- which is strange because he knows Dutch better than he knows himself, but its then that Arthur realizes he'd subconsciously moved to place himself between Williamson and the woman. Shuddering breaths sound quietly from behind him and it makes him clench his teeth. 

"Plus," Arthur forces out of his tight jaw, "I think Williamson should come with me to shoot up the O'Driscoll's our _friend_ here will be leadin' us to." Arthur nods his head at Bill, "Go grab Marston and tell him he's ridin' with us." 

Bill looks to Dutch,

"Go with Arthur," Dutch says, "We'll leave the other O'Driscoll here to contemplate her _options_." 

Arthur turns then, actively choosing to ignore the subtle complexity of what just happened, as he hauls the O'Driscoll boy along threatening him the entire short way to the hitching posts. 

* * *

Across camp Hosea had been watching the whole exchange. His eyebrows dig low into his gaze when he catches the undecipherable look Dutch gives Arthur's back. 

* * *

The second you're left alone, you feel exposed in a way you hadn't before. With Kieran gone you find your fear has tripled. There is no one to share the horror with, no one to exchange small whispered words of comfort in the middle of the night, no one to just be there beside you. It's just you, freshly re-tied to the tree, by yourself and vulnerable. It hits you then how truly alone you are, and you realize that you literally don't know anybody. Even if you escaped or were miraculously let go, you couldn't reach out to anyone not because there's no cell phones or any means of getting in touch with someone, but because no one you know has been _born yet._ You are alone in the world, alone like you've never been before. You have no one. 

 _You have no one_. 

The punch of devastation lands swiftly against your chest. The feeling takes your breath away and despite all your success in not showing your true feelings thus far, your face crumples and your head, suddenly much too heavy to hold up, lowers to hang. And like a button was pressed your lungs heave dry sobs past your lips. You're so distracted with your sorrow you forget to stifle your noises. 

"Miss?" 

Your head shoots up and a painful gasp wrenches open your cinched airways. 

"I'm sorry! I didn't mean to startle you." 

It takes your eyes a moment to settle on the tiny figure before you. The sun has journeyed over the sky some since Arthur took Kieran, so evening shadows have begun casting themselves low along the ground. The young boy Jack's shadow stretches all the way to your feet. Your heart settles some from its frantic galloping when you take in the boy's face. Curiosity holds most of the real estate on his features at the moment and you try to soothe yourself as he prepares to talk.

"I was just wonderin' if you were alright?" Jack has his hands knotted together like he knows he's doing something he shouldn't be. You figure talking to the camp prisoner fell under things his mother Abigail would firmly disapprove of. 

"I'm okay Jack, go back to your mother. She'll want you near since its getting darker." You manage to say after wrestling your heartbeat and breathing back to normal. 

Jack scuffs the tip of his small worn shoe against the dirt, eyes down, head cocked a little as he thinks. 

"I just heard you makin' sounds I make when I'm really sad," Your heart clenches at his innocence, at the free kindness of a child, "And I just wanted to tell you that I hope you feel better." 

With that Jack quickly turns and scampers away -- only to run smack into Javier who happened to be walking by. 

"Woah!" Javier exclaims as he trips over the small kid and Jack tumbles to his knees with a small 'oof', "Slow down Jack," 

Jack mumbles something to Javier you can't hear (you assume its an apology), before Javier helps him to his feet and watches as Jack sprints off in the direction of his mother. Javier looks after Jack for a moment before retracing the boy's initial direction and finding his eyes landing on you. Your heart stops and you immediately lower your gaze. Besides Arthur, Javier is the hardest to get a read on, the hardest to predict. Even towards his own gang members the man keeps people on their best behavior and at a distance. You feel him deciding whether or not to come over, a few throbbing beats go by then -- _thank god_ \-- you hear him walk away towards one of the main campfires where most of the camp is collected. Everyone is currently eating dinner and you're grateful the beginnings of a song is enough to coax the man away.

As you sag against the tree you can do nothing but hope for Kieran's return...if he returns at all.  

What if Arthur kills him? What if Bill or John kills him? 

What if Kieran is set free or escapes and never comes back?

You're especially terrified of that. Of him _choosing_ to leave you even though you wouldn't blame him if he did and would probably do the exact same if the situation were reversed. You know you're just being selfish and awful but you can't help it. 

 _You have no one._  

* * *

"You're free!"

Your head jerks up at the sound of a familiar voice a few hours later and the loss of tension in the ropes holding you hostage. You don't have the ability to respond as your lungs decide to freeze solid in your chest while your mind works to digest his words. You near collapse as the meaning of them finally settles. 

"Wha --," You start with your eyebrows low, chest tight, and scarcely believing what you're hearing. 

"Just _what_ do you think you're doin'?" Kieran and you both jump at Arthur's booming voice as he manifests out of the murky evening shadows to loom behind Kieran. 

Kieran pivots, "I-I-I thought you said I was one of you now? I th-thought --," 

"I said _you's_  apart of us now, not her." 

"But I told you she ain't an O'Driscoll! I told you she --,"

"Just because she ain't an O'Driscoll don't mean she's not a spy." Dutch boasts as he exists his tent, approaching the situation with a very unfriendly look in his eye that does not bode well for you. 

You shrink back against the tree, no matter how much the action hurts your back and savagely kills your hope. 

"The second you're told you're allowed to live you try settin' our prisoner free? That ain't makin' me too happy boah," Arthur grits through his teeth at Kieran who is quickly backing away from you, arms thrown up in surrender. 

"That's not what I meant!" Kieran rushes to explain as you stare up at Dutch who watches you cower before him, "I didn't mean no offense! Promise! I thought --,"

"Well it don't matter what you thought! You may be travelin' with us now but you is still an O'Driscoll, you still hold no respect or position in this gang let alone have the freedom to choose whether or not to release goddamn prisoners!" 

Kieran stumbles on something as he'd been backing up from a slowly advancing Arthur, and he trips and falls. He scrambles to his knees and stays there. 

"Please sir I didn't mean nothin' by it! I'm sorry!" 

"What is it you want Miss?" Dutch drawls as he addresses you. Arthur turns his attention towards you at Dutch's words. 

"What?" You whisper, not able to manage a stronger tone. 

"What is it, that you want?" Dutch repeats with diction so sharp it could cut. 

You know this is probably a trick question, but you're too scared and your mind is too scattered by panic to think of anything clever. 

"I want to go home." You reply in hushed devastated defeat. 

"And where is home exactly?" 

You pause at this, unsure of what to say.

_Ah yes I'm from the future and I don't know how to get back! I've time traveled you see and have no idea where I am, what year it is, or who the fuck you people are! Also time traveling is apparently a no shoes no shirt no pants kind of service and you loose any recent memories on top of it! I don't know where I was when I traveled, if I did anything specific or was with anyone when it happened. I remember everything up until the big black space in my memory! Very confusing I know, but if you'd be so kind as to not burn me alive for witchcraft and send me on my way that'd be great!_

"Where are you from?" Dutch demands again, moving closer to you and becoming more menacing as you hesitate. 

"Up north mostly." Is the weak answer you end up going with. 

"Where up north, mostly?" Dutch immediately furthers. 

Your mind goes blank when Arthur moves closer to you, both men crowding you into a corner, pushing you back into the tree with each step towards you.

"Why won't you tell us where you are from?" 

You silently apologize to your family and friends, but mostly to yourself as you finally...after all this suffering...despite your promises to fight...

Silence reigns, signaling your choice to give up. These people want to kill you, hurt you, have been wanting to finish what they started and you're done denying the inevitability of your situation. You're done. 

You hear the click of the safety before you register the hollow barrel of a revolver Dutch points straight between your eyes. No reaction claims your body though, no emotion runs through your heart, no clever escape plan tries to desperately form in your mind...just emptiness and a hollowed out feeling you assume used to be your agony. 

"I'll ask you one last time, where are you from?" Dutch pauses then adds, "And who do you work for? Is it the Pinkertons? You have a contract with them?" 

"Who?" You find yourself breathing out on a weak exhale, unable to do anything else but stare through the barrel of the weapon aimed at you, past Dutch, and into the nothingness you would soon join. 

"They say they'll pay a handsome sum if you bring us all in?!" 

Your face smoothes out as Dutch becomes more impassioned. Here it comes. 

"You workin' with the law?! You an agent from Blackwater?!" 

"Dutch --," A new voice attempts to interrupt. The older man, Hosea, appears at Dutch's flank. His eyes alight with alarm. 

"How much money they offerin' you?! They holdin' your secrets hostage?!" 

You close your eyes. Any second now.

"Dutch!" Hosea yells, but Dutch remains undeterred. 

"You apart of a network?! Huh?! Are there people you workin' with?! Do you have people?!" 

"I..." The world crystallizes into glass around you, immortalizing the moment, "I have no one." You  _whisper_ , voice collapsing as your soul wrenches itself free with each breath, preparing to depart. "I have nothing. I am no one."  _In this time._

A feeling so volatile and destructive ignites in your chest then and it reminds you of dying stars. You fall to your knees. 

* * *

Arthur feels violently uncomfortable as he watches the woman once again dissolve into misery, not even afraid anymore just...done. She's given up. To see someone let go like that makes Arthur cling to his desire to stay alive even more fiercely than he already does. The simple cosmic irony of giving up in a world where dying happens so easily anyway is wrong -- unnatural, it goes against everything Arthur knows.

_Two graves. Ten dollars._

Arthur's chest seizes as his reality spins, no one should give up like that. But its not until Arthur sees the look on Hosea's face that the true severity of what they're doing to the woman sinks in. Arthur feels like a hole has just been punched straight through his chest, leaving a gaping gory mass of space where his heart should be as he realizes the look on Hosea's face is disgust. 

 _Disgust_. 

And its aimed at Dutch.

An inhale forces itself past Arthur's lips and burns in his chest when Hosea steps in front of the woman, and slowly crouches down before her. 

"Wha -- Hosea," Dutch attempts to explain, affronted and just as shocked as Arthur by the look he'd been given, "I had to get the truth out of her! You know how watched we are these days. It was for the safety of the gang! I had to do it for us!" 

Arthur thinks that's a good reason, he'd do anything for the gang too even if the method didn't sit well with him and it cost him hours of sleep at night, but Hosea doesn't even bother to respond as he starts murmuring soft things to the shaking woman on the ground.

* * *

When you hear the safety click back on and Dutch smoothly holster his weapon, a surge of sensation overwhelms you. It feels like breaching the surf of a raging ocean, sound-sight-smell-touch-breath- _life_ roaring at you from all sides. The high that comes after surviving hits you hard -- _your soul resettling in your body_ \-- accompanied by a few choice emotions; surprise in yourself is one of them, relief is the most prominent, but that disturbingly detached sort of defeat still lurks in the middle of it all.

You realize with a start that you just evolved, you were presented with an opportunity to fail -- your life literally on the line -- and you survived, even if just barely. A man, Hosea you think, is crouching in front of you, voice gentle words soft trying to coax you away from the emptiness as Dutch rounds on Kieran. 

"Whats your name?" He inquires delicately, a kind of respect lining his tone that wasn't there before. 

The only hard confirmation you have that you are no longer a prisoner. 

 _Fuck him_ , you seethe as suddenly that void in you is lit up and replacing it -- manifesting from it -- is insurmountable wrath that burns through what's left of your reservations,  _fuck all of them._

Eyes a riot of chaos and emotional carnage, you lift your gaze up to Hosea. You watch him take in your expression, watch him as he realizes how dangerous it was to mistreat you. He falls silent, weathered face dropping from its genuine sympathetic plight to one of poorly masked weariness. 

You say your name and its a promise, "Y/n." 

* * *

Arthur knows then that if they don't make her one of them, have her truly believe she has a place in their gang, she would find a way to kill them all.

He witnesses as her will rises from the ashes of her defeat like a phoenix, sparking an invisible fuse with an unpredictable and inevitable explosion at the end of it. Her rebirth is the most magnificent, humbling, and terrifying thing he has ever witnessed. It puts him in sheer trembling awe of her, the kind of awe he gets when watching a bear fight off a pack of wolves single-handedly and  _win_. The kind of awe that leaves him speechless, that appeals to his own unyielding will and tells him he doesn't stand a chance, not really, not if its important, not against her. 

He sees the fury take hold of her, relishing in its newest host, and the twisted part of him that's sick with violence  _grins_.

Unable, or more like unwilling, to process the swath of emotion currently attempting to suffocate him, Arthur tears his gaze away from her -- away from her fury that threatens to ignite his own, and heads straight for Sabine before getting the fuck out of camp.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thoughts? Share them below if you'd like xx

**Author's Note:**

> Um yeah so this happened. Let me know what you think if you want to, or message me if you feel like freaking out over anything RDR2 related bc im so down and also I need to know that everyone else is suffering too bc arthur morgan deserved better :''''')


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